Canopy is the feature film debut of Australian director, Aaron Wilson, and is set in 1942 during the Japanese invasion of Singapore. Jim (Khan Chittenden) is an Australian airman who wakes up suspended from a tree by his parachute strings. As he struggles to escape from the vast wilderness he finds himself in, he runs into a Chinese resistance fighter, Seng (Mo Tzu-Yi).

The two men share virtually no common language – and the film is unusual in that it contains very little dialogue. Instead it is filled with the sounds of the jungle, with the distant sounds of war and an immersive, ambient soundtrack.

Tom Brook speaks with Aaron Wilson about the director’s concept of mateship and how he explored the intimate relationships that can strike up between two people in wartime. He also asks Chittenden about the challenges and benefits of appearing in a film with so few words to speak.

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